NCCC showing documentary about poet Elizabeth Bishop

Feb. 7—Niagara County Community College this week will host a screening a documentary about one of the 20th century's most famous American poets.

John Scott, a media arts professor at Ithaca College, will be showing his 2021 film, "Elizabeth Bishop and The Art of Losing," at the NCCC Arts and Media Theatre on campus at 2 p.m. on Wednesday. The screening is part of the community college's year-long 60th anniversary celebrations.

"I am interested in making films that explore fundamental questions of who we are and that can hopefully open up interesting conversations about who we are and why we do the things we do," Scott said, who has been making films since he was a student in 1988. He also made a documentary about the Canadian poet John Stiles titled, "Scouts are Cancelled."

Bishop was a famous American poet who served as the Consultant in Poetry to the Library of Congress from 1949 to 1950. She won the Pulitzer Prize for Poetry in 1956 and was the National Book Award winner in 1970.

While her poems did draw from her life experiences, they were often written using discretion and from a distant point of view.

"This film gives the viewer one clear glimpse into the demanding creative process that leads to the making of poetry," said NCCC professor and program coordinator Ian Stapley, who reached out to Scott after seeing a screening in Ithaca.

It took Scott 10 years to make this documentary, starting first by making short films of her poems and working on integrating those into the larger context of her life story. It features montages of animation, re-enactments of key moments of her life, and archival film footage and audio recordings to suggest a series of losses led her to write one of her most famous poems, "One Art."

"I think her poem 'One Art' is a work of genius whose narrative arc becomes more and more fascinating as you understand her life better and what brings her to the moment in her sixties when under great emotional stress, she forces herself to be vulnerable and to write it," Scott said.

Bishop was very secretive about her life and she did not allow many photos to be taken of her, with almost no moving pictures of her at all. For Scott, this necessitated a creative approach to telling her story and why it took so long to complete.

Because of that secrecy, her poems did not easily reveal who she was as a person, with "One Art" written over the loss of a person she loved. Scott said he was fascinated by that journey to a work of such depth and genius.

Outside of this screening, "Elizabeth Bishop and The Art of Losing" has been shown at a few international festivals and a one week run at the Cinemapolis movie theater in Ithaca. It will also be shown at SUNY Oswego this Friday and the Brooklyn Public Library on Saturday. Scott has plans to show it at other public events this spring and summer.

The event is free to the public and refreshments will be provided.